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May 14, 2012 (TexLife.org) - Some Ft. Worth residents believe that this is what happens when Planned Parenthood can’t get their way in Dallas. Others think the location was chosen for other reasons. No matter the strategy, one thing is certain: Planned Parenthood is building a late-term abortion clinic in Ft. Worth – next to a nationally recognized adoption agency.

It began with a simple transaction.

Cerine Management, LLC, formed in 2009, bought a parcel of land in southwest Ft. Worth. The company’s records were vague. Elizabeth Solender of Solender Hall Commercial Real Estate, a broker representing Cerine, purchased land from a Ft. Worth man named Dan McDonald, who was told it would be used for an ambulatory surgical center. Solender, an influential League of Women Voters type known among North Texas power politics players and non-profit feminists, specializes in transferring real estate from companies to non-profits.

Rumors began to spread around the Ft. Worth area when a former Planned Parenthood executive converted to Christianity in Denison and told her pastor that Planned Parenthood was planning something horrible in Ft. Worth. Pastors, like the rest of us, talk. Her pastor told another pastor, Dr. Michael Dean of Travis Avenue Baptist Church, in the fall of 2011.

Not yet knowing what Planned Parenthood had up their sleeve, or where their big idea might land, Dean contacted The Edna Gladney Center, and together they formed the Life Advisory Team to explore the sinister possibility of Planned Parenthood making inroads in southwest Ft. Worth. Unfortunately, Planned Parenthood was too secretive. Before any action was taken, ground was broken.

The general contractor on the 19,377-square-foot, two-story job is The DeMoss Co. With long-term ties to Ft. Worth, Jim DeMoss also has ties to Planned Parenthood. His wife Margaret’s name was associated with the 2010 annual Planned Parenthood budget report; she was a fundraiser for their $21-million North Texas campaign, and the Ft. Worth co-chair.

Sources say DeMoss failed to inform his employees what kind of facility they were building. When they found out, he allowed Planned Parenthood to warn them of violent extremists, angry protesters, and the threat of bodily harm, leaving them shaken but committed to staying on the job.

DeMoss has reportedly built many churches in Ft. Worth and surrounding areas for about fifteen years, many of which were featured on his website, including Travis Avenue Baptist. At last look they had been removed from the page, some say at the churches’ request.

Texans for Life has also been told that there was no indication anywhere on the plans filed with the municipality that the end result would be a Planned Parenthood center – and not just a center, but an ambulatory surgery, where late-term abortions can be committed next door to The Edna Gladney Center, a well-known adoption agency. Planned Parenthood has denied any deception and claimed that they are forced to operate in secret for fear of violent activism. They have also, according to peaceful boycott members and protesters, installed an alarm triggered to go off if anyone gets too near the curb (for prayer, parking, etc.); the alarm blasts directly into the dormitory wing of the Gladney adoption center, where expectant mothers are housed.

It wasn’t until he was given the address of the new Planned Parenthood site that Tim Pulliam of Pulliam Concrete realized that he was on that very job, and scheduled to pour in the morning. He immediately pulled his men and walked away, followed by Tri-Dal, Phillips Electric (saying, “We’d rather walk than have anything to do with a job like that”), and other subcontractors. Rone Engineers, founded and run by a Catholic, will do no additional work on the site.

While many, like Pulliam, got involved against their will and want nothing to do with publicity, others are happy to be involved, showing up daily to pray and protest. Pro-life activist Chris Danze is leading the boycott, with help from Texans for Life Coalition and other organizations. A protester holding a sign bearing the face of an aborted fetus last Wednesday reported that a worker leaving the site pointed to it and asked, “Is that what we’re building?” When she replied that it was, he said, “I’m done; I’m not coming back. I’m pro-life, so I won’t be working this job anymore.”

Abortions up to 24 weeks’ gestation will be committed at this surgical center once it is completed. Meanwhile, TLC and all of pro-life North Texas ask for your support. If enough outrage and concern are expressed to the DeMoss Co. and whoever steps up to replace them, we can keep this abomination from opening its doors in our community. Call 817-920-9990 to respectfully express your opinion to the DeMoss Co., or write to them at 4205 Stadium Dr. #100, Ft. Worth, TX, 76133.
This article first appeared at TexLife.org and is published with permission.

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Disney ABC embraces X-rated anti-Christian bigot Dan Savage in new prime time show

March 30, 2015 (NewsBusters.org) -- Media Research Center (MRC) and Family Research Council (FRC) are launching a joint national campaign to educate the public about a Disney ABC sitcom pilot based on the life of bigoted activist Dan Savage. MRC and FRC contacted Ben Sherwood, president of Disney/ABC Television Group, more than two weeks ago urging him to put a stop to this atrocity but received no response. [Read the full letter]

A perusal of Dan Savage’s work reveals a career built on advocating violence — even murder — and spewing hatred against people of faith. Savage has spared no one with whom he disagrees from his vitriolic hate speech. Despite his extremism, vulgarity, and unabashed encouragement of dangerous sexual practices, Disney ABC is moving forward with this show, disgustingly titled “Family of the Year.”

Media Research Center President Brent Bozell reacts:

“Disney ABC’s decision to effectively advance Dan Savage’s calls for violence against conservatives and his extremist attacks against people of faith, particularly evangelicals and Catholics, is appalling and outrageous. If hate speech were a crime, this man would be charged with a felony. Disney ABC giving Dan Savage a platform for his anti-religious bigotry is mind-boggling and their silence is deafening.

“By creating a pilot based on the life of this hatemonger and bringing him on as a producer, Disney ABC is sending a signal that they endorse Dan Savage’s wish that a man be murdered. He has stated, ‘Carl Romanelli should be dragged behind a pickup truck until there’s nothing left but the rope.’ ABC knows this. We told them explicitly.

“If the production of ‘Family of the Year’ is allowed to continue, not just Christians but all people of goodwill can only surmise that the company Walt Disney created is endorsing violence.”

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins reacts:

“Does ABC really want to produce a pilot show based on a vile bully like Dan Savage? Do Dan Savage’s over-the top-obscenity, intimidation of teenagers and even violent rhetoric reflect the values of Disney? Partnering with Dan Savage and endorsing his x-rated message will be abandoning the wholesome values that have attracted millions of families to Walt Disney.”

Dan Savage has made numerous comments about conservatives, evangelicals, and Catholics that offend basic standards of decency. They include:

Proclaiming that he sometimes thinks about “f****ing the shit out of” Senator Rick Santorum

Calling for Christians at a high school conference to “ignore the bull**** in the Bible”

Saying that “the only thing that stands between my d*** and Brad Pitt’s mouth is a piece of paper” when expressing his feelings on Pope Benedict’s opposition to gay marriage

Promoting marital infidelity

Saying “Carl Romanelli should be dragged behind a pickup truck until there’s nothing left but the rope.”

Telling Bill Maher that he wished Republicans “were all f***ing dead”

Telling Dr. Ben Carson to “suck my d***. Name the time and place and I’ll bring my d*** and a camera crew and you can s*** me off and win the argument.”

Many would be surprised to learn that Texas law allows physicians to forcibly remove a feeding tube against the will of the patient and their family. In fact, there is a greater legal penalty for failing to feed or water an animal than for a hospital to deny a human being food and water through a tube.

This is because there is no penalty whatsoever for a healthcare provider who wishes to deny artificially-administered nutrition and hydration (AANH). According to Texas Health and Safety Code, “every living dumb creature” is legally entitled access to suitable food and water.

Denying an animal food and water, like in this January case in San Antonio, is punishable by civil fines up to $10,000 and criminal penalties up to two years in jail per offense. Yet Texas law allows health care providers to forcibly deny food and water from human beings – what they would not be able to legally do to their housecat. And healthcare providers are immune from civil and criminal penalties for denial of food and water to human beings as long as they follow the current statutory process which is sorely lacking in safeguards.

Therefore, while it is surprising that Texas has the only state law that explicitly mentions food and water delivered artificially for the purpose of completely permitting its forced denial (the other six states mention AANH explicitly for the opposite purpose, to limit or prohibit its refusal), it is not at all surprising that the issue of protecting a patient’s right to food and water is perhaps the one point of consensus across all major stakeholders.

H.B. 3074 is the first TADA reform bill to include only this provision that is agreed upon across all major players in previous legislative sessions.

There are irreconcilable ideological differences between two major right-to-life organizations that should supposedly be like-minded: Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Right to Life. Each faction (along with their respective allies) have previously sponsored broad and ambitious bills to either preserve but reform the current law (Texas Alliance for Life’s position) or overturn it altogether as Texas Right to Life aims to do.

Prior to H.B. 3074, bills filed by major advocacy organizations have often included AANH, but also a host of other provisions that were so contentious and unacceptable to other organizations that each bill ultimately died, and this mutually-agreed-upon and vital reform always died along with it.

2011 & 2013 Legislative Sessions present prime example

This 2011 media report shows the clear consensus on need for legislation to simply address the need to protect patients’ rights to food and water:

“Hughes [bill sponsor for Texas Right to Life] has widespread support for one of his bill’s goals: making food and water a necessary part of treatment and not something that can be discontinued, unless providing it would harm the patient.”

Nonetheless, in 2013, both organizations and their allies filed complicated, contentious opposing bills, both of which would have protected a patient’s right to food and water but each bill also included provisions the rival group saw as contrary to their goals. Both bills were ultimately defeated and neither group was able to achieve protections for patients at risk of forced starvation and dehydration – a mutual goal that could have been met through a third, narrow bill like H.B. 3074.

H.B. 3074 finally focuses on what unites the organizations involved rather than what divides them, since these differences have resulted in a 12 year standoff with no progress whatsoever.

H.B. 3074 is progress that is pre-negotiated and pre-approved.

It is not a fertile springboard for negotiations on an area of mutual agreement. Rather it is the culmination of years of previous negotiations on bills that all came too late, either due to the complexnature of rival bills, the controversy involved, or even both.

On the contrary, H.B. 3074 is not just simply an area of agreement; moreover, it is has already been negotiated. It should not be stymied by disagreements on language, since Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Right to Life (along with their allies) were able to agree on language in 2007 with C.S.S.B. 439. C.S.S.B. 439 reads that, unlike the status quo that places no legal conditions on when food and water may be withdrawn, it would be permitted for those in a terminal condition if,

“reasonable medical evidence indicates the provision of artificial nutrition and hydration may hasten the patient’s death or seriously exacerbate other major medical problems and the risk of serious medical pain or discomfort that cannot be alleviated based on reasonable medical judgment outweighs the benefit of continued artificial nutrition and hydration.”

This language is strikingly similar to H.B. 3074 which states, “except that artificially administered nutrition and hydration must be provided unless, based on reasonable medical judgment, providingartificially administered nutrition and hydration would:

Hasten the patient’s death;

Seriously exacerbate other major medical problems not outweighed by the benefit of the provision of the treatment;

Result in substantial irremediable physical pain, suffering, or discomfort not outweighed by the benefit of the provision of the treatment;

Be medically ineffective; or

Be contrary to the patient’s clearly stated desire not to receive artificially administered nutrition or hydration.”

Texas Right to Life would support the language in H.B. 3074 that already has Texas Alliance for Life’s endorsement. Any reconciliation on the minor differences in language would therefore be minimal and could be made by either side, but ultimately, both sides and their allies would gain a huge victory – the first victory in 12 years on this vital issue.

It seems that the Texas Advance Directive Act, even among its sympathizers, has something for everyone to oppose.

The passage of H.B. 3074 and the legal restoration of rights to feeding tubes for Texas patients will not begin to satisfy critics of the Texas Advance Directives Act who desire much greater changes to the law and will assuredly continue to pursue them. H.B. 3074 in no way marks the end for healthcare reform, but perhaps a shift from the belief that anything short of sweeping changes is an endorsement of the status quo.

Rather, we can look at H.B. 3074 as breaking a barrier and indicating larger changes are possible.

And if nothing else, by passing H.B. 3074 introduced by State Rep. Drew Springer, we afford human beings in Texas the same legal access to food and water that we give to our horses. What is cruel to do to an animal remains legal to do to humans in Texas if organizations continue to insist on the whole of their agenda rather than agreeing to smaller bills like H.B. 3074.

The question is, can twelve years of bad blood and bickering be set aside for even this most noble of causes?

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I can’t believe how quickly our annual Spring campaign has flown by. Now,with only 3 days remaining, we still have $96,000 left to raise to meet our absolute minimum goal.

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